Creating A Winning Strategic Plan. Don’t Just Dream It. DO IT!
Vicky Richards
Providing CEO Advisory Boards, Business Coaching and Strategic Planning Services to Growth-Oriented Entrepreneurs
Written in partnership with Claudia Franco Kelly, TAB of Central New Jersey Certified Facilitator
Note: This is the second article in a four-part series focusing on Strategic Planning. You can find the first article in this series, “A Strategic Plan is Your Map to Future Success,” here.
Successful business owners understand the important role a strategic plan plays in their success. Yet many business owners struggle with strategic planning, citing they lack the time, knowledge or process to create effective plans and deliver results.
With a bit of knowledge and time, business owners can develop strategic plans that move their companies forward.
Annual strategic planning is a fundamental part of what we do at TAB CNJ. With years of experience working with business owners to establish achievable goals and a long-term vision we have learned that creating an effective strategic plan can be viewed as a four-part process:
In this blog we’ll focus on:
STEP TWO: PRIORITIZING AND CREATING THE PLAN
Know Your Strengths and Weaknesses
Strategic planning begins by determining your company’s strengths and weaknesses. A SWOT analysis is a powerful tool to get you started. A SWOT analysis assesses your company’s Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. It can help you identify the issues you need to address in your strategic planning.
Prioritize Your Strategic Goals
Use the SWOT analysis to identify the most critical and strategic issues your company faces. Chances are you’ll have a list of issues you’d like to tackle.
Be cognizant of the finite amount of time you have to manage your business and take on these issues and that it is unlikely you can include all of them in your strategic plan. Focus on developing a realistic and manageable strategic plan and prioritize the three-to-five most important issues.
Ask yourself:
The answers to these three important questions will give you a solid point to start developing your goals.
Be SMART
Now it’s time to take the issues you’ve identified and create your goals. Unfortunately, many small business owners reach this critical stage only to create well-meaning, yet fuzzy, goals.
According to the website The Balance Small Business, “Every successful business has clearly set and articulated goals to attain specific objectives. Yet, in the world of small business, many businesses lack a focused goal. ‘Get more business’ is a typical reply of small business owners when asked of future plans. Any self-respecting CEO would be tossed out of a shareholder meeting for uttering a vague response.”
The key to success is to create focused goals that result in actionable plans. The SMART method can help you create goals that move your company forward. SMART stands for:
A SMART Approach to Strategic Planning
Let’s take a look at each step.
Be Specific
What, exactly, do you want to accomplish? Create goals that are direct, detailed and meaningful. Creating a well-defined and focused goal is much more powerful than a vague goal. Stating you want to “grow your business” is vague. “I want to grow my business by 15%” is specific.
Even better, state how you will achieve your goal. “I want to grow my business by 15% by increasing my marketing efforts by 3Q 2022” is a goal that not only states what you want to achieve, but the tools you will use to get you to success.
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Set Measurable Goals
“A goal without a measurable outcome is like a sports competition without a scoreboard or scorekeeper,” states The Balance Small Business. Never assume you’re succeeding. You want to create goals that are quantifiable to track progress and success.
What can you measure?
Choose measurements that pertain to your business and goals.
Be Achievable
In baseball, everyone wants to hit a home run when they step up to the plate. Yet that’s not a reasonable expectation. The same is true for your business. Goals must be achievable. Set goals that are realistic and that you have the tools and/or resources to attain.
Assign a Responsible Party
Often a strategic plan is packed full of meaningful goals which, once achieved, will really move the needle. Yet they never seem to make it across the finish line because no one was assigned as the champion to make sure work on the goal moves forward.
Assign ownership of each goal, or portions of the goal, to a specific team member. Provide a clear definition of success and hold them accountable to achieving the deliverable. They may not be the one that actually does all of the work related to the goal, but rather they are Responsible for making sure there is a game plan for achieving it and that the ball is progressing down the field.
Time Bound
When do you want to achieve your goals? In six months? In a year? Set specific target dates. End dates may be different for different goals. Regardless, your goals have to have specific deadlines. Without a deadline you may wander aimlessly without ever achieving success.
Once you create your target dates, break each goal into specific tasks and create timelines to measure progress and maintain motivation and momentum.
In Addition …
During the goal setting process you’ll also want to keep in mind the cost of working on each goal. A cost-benefit analysis can help you determine if a goal is the best use of your company time, money and resources.
As a part of the TAB planning process we encourage our members to model the process out and be inclusive and honest about all of the costs necessary to achieve the goal and realistic about its potential upside.
Questions to Ask:
For more information on how to conduct a cost-benefit analysis see How to Do a Cost-Benefit Analysis & Why It’s Important at the Harvard Business School Online. You can also contact us and we will share some of our insights and experience.
TAB CNJ Provides Support for Small Businesses
If you’re unsure of your ability to create a successful strategic plan, help is available. TAB CNJ (The Alternative Board™ of Central New Jersey) helps small companies create effective strategic plans and meet their goals. TAB members have access to a structured, proven strategic planning method led by a trained business coach. Member companies also participate in peer-advisory boards that provide valuable ideas, insights and honest feedback.
With TAB, you can create a strategic plan that will provide actionable goals that address the important issues facing your company. Schedule your 30 minute complimentary strategic plan review today!
TAB Benefits
TAB offers busy entrepreneurs a powerful, streamlined program that includes peer advisory boards, one-on-one coaching, workshops, expert speakers, robust business tools and invaluable TAB connections. TAB helps business owners and leaders navigate difficult business conditions, discover new opportunities and achieve their strategic goals.
Up Next: CommunicatingYour Strategic Plan